I would only have something substantial to contribute in response to just a few points made in the concise pieces below that we're sharing here today:

In the so-called millennial generation, we all seem to be able to use a bit of help with making any choices, precisely because there are so many (the Great Recession will surely temper some of this haughtiness). Given that, "showing off" does have it's place, if tempered in a disciplined manner. In my multi-regional experience, working with a very artificially limited amount of time is only a limitation because we have extremely limited access to natural things in our immediate environment (or, say, less than 30 minutes away) -- such as sacred land (where one might be able to build a fire to share stories, take a swim, catch some fish, go on a hike, or stare at the stars, with one's ancestors "watching" over the courting process from the trees) -- that speak volumes quickly. Sure we have sacred maroon spaces in Babylon, but they are not the same {see: "Why maroon community is not enough"}. Without such framework for our modern lives, I don't blame anyone harshly, or with too much disappointment, for their lack of instinctual sight; being disconnected from natural Earth simply diminishes our natural instincts. We must all be patient with one another, albeit to a degree lest we become, as the writer suggests below, "missionaries" or simply pulled from our foundation. Mos Def's ex-wife might have valuable insight into mate assessment, but certainly it's limited to a few specific types of query.

In fact, in another text of his, the writer hints at the type of "simultaneous consciousness" (that I think of as a diplomacy between dimensions of the past, present and future) involved with "showing off" in a disciplined, efficient manner:

/////"Dr. Hendrix writes about his daughter having the characteristics of what he calls 'original wholeness': "When all her physical needs were taken care of, she would nestle into our arms and look around her with the contentment of Buddha. Like all babies she had no awareness of herself as a separate being and no internal divisions between thoughts, feelings, and actions. To my eyes, she was experiencing a primitive spirituality, a universe without boundaries."

"Before this wonderful description, he introduces the technical term “autistic period” when “the baby makes no distinction between itself and the rest of the world.” Now, with these two items laid down into the rasx() context, let’s add that the great “arms race” in the Old Kingdom of Africa was to never abandon this “primitive spirituality” yet simultaneously develop a distinction between the self and 'the rest of the world' governed by eternal, divine laws of natural science. These two “contradictions” sound just like the polyrhythmic music that is Old Africa [editor's emphasis]. It is bizarre, beyond the imagination of most New-World, science-fiction writers to imagine an entire nation sincerely devoted to raising healthy, whole children such that even the 'adult words' in the language are easy for a child to say and carry for the rest of her life.

"It is utterly ridiculous to try to 'convince' a kid from a broken, Western home that there existed a people who built gigantic monuments for the education of future children of their family. Surely the pyramids were built by slave-driving egomaniacs because 'our Greek heritage' sees utopia as unachievable (since it is clearly unachievable by Greeks). You can stop a conversation and quickly run to the edges of the flat-earth map for the self-described-but-European-trained “African feminist” who is simply unable to imagine matriarchy on this scale. A nation where all the male leaders are chosen by women—not depressed, insecure, bitter women but wise, powerful, whole women—a Queen mother not from England? You probably can’t do it. 'Primitive spirituality' is for babies. So let’s crack a few jokes and forget about it."/////

Put simply, rather than not play "the game" because we don't see any worthy partners, we might play speed "chess" (in order to "hurry up" and locate a worthy partner) that allows us more time for other things alongside our "chess habit", ever mindful that the increased rate results in not only decreased time, but thus also requires increased focus with the time allotted.

We "millennials" are perhaps playing double consciousness with the wrong dimensions -- and algebraic values with different base variables do not go together -- trying to balance romanticism with general architecture, instead of balancing personal architecture with familial architecture. Once I began to witness God, romance became just a cheap, wasteful, and egotistical substitute.

The reader may also benefit from an introduction to the style of this text. A recent observation of a previously invisible-to-me comment at Kintespace.com revealed this about the style and process of the writer:

/////"The long ass sentences will most likely be from English writers like Dickens. But I am no expert on this—but writers in his day were paid by the word. I write in this English style mostly because of Monty Python. I think it is funny but readers that assume I take myself seriously often fail to assume that I am being funny. Chris Rock had the same problem: his early work was too subtle for the stereotypes of the time (like right now)—eventually he bypassed the Franklin Ajaye style and came up with a field holler the people can understand."/////

So, despite the sensationalist, satirical title of this post, you won't find much hollering here. But I trust the serious reader will find this text literally full of relevant ideas. Happy reading.

Flippant Remarks about “Sorry Successful Black Women, but Most of Ya’ll Ain’t as Cute as You Think”

A simple fact that too many black women over look is that powerful, successful men like beautiful women. Having a beautiful woman on his arm connotes power. It signals to the world that he is the man and the woman on his arm is the living breathing beautiful proof of his man-ness. Now this gets a little tricky if the man in question is in politics or some other very public high powered position. That man needs a woman who is going to play the role of high powered wife well and that may trump looks…for his wife. You best [believe] his mistress will be a stunner.

And he will have a mistress.

... Dating at the top of the food chain is cutthroat, dog eat dog, and if you’re not coming with the right weaponry, and for women that means stunning looks, it’s going to be a tough row to hoe. There’s no getting around that, no matter how much we may want it not to be true.

My girl wrote this article about the self-described “mean” woman, Helena Andrews. Her memoir with the word “bitch” in the title is on sale near you. So now that I’ve laid out the context of today’s rasx() context, here’s the jumble for your neuro-melanized right-brain to sort out:

*Here is more harsh truth that Brown Sugar will agree with: too many “successful” women are not physically attractive—and this is often the reason why they are “successful.” Often the rule is this: “successful” women retreated from their bodies and thrive in a world of ideas while attractive women “genetic celebrities” are forced to live in their bodies. No Christian nation in the world forces women more than the United States of America.

*One common trait of retreating from the physical body (for both men and women) is to overeat and take no exercise. Often, too, too often this is the only reason why “successful” women are not attractive (to me).

*The “top of the dating food chain” is relative—not absolute. To imply that there is one “chain” means mental bondage leading into a velvet-covered slave pen—or we are talking about a high school lunch room or the only night club in town.

*When a woman (like Helena Andrews) is being “mean” during an encounter, this is often an impatient, pre-emptive strike against the possibility of rejection.

*The fear of rejection is often seen by me as a lack of courage—and my lack of sexism here often, ironically unwelcome: I fully expect women to be brave.

*Trying to navigate around the insecurities of women can cost a do-right man hundreds of thousands of dollars—and maybe even his life. I am gravely serious about this as I have the cherished relatives in my family to prove it.

*“Successful” women are often competitive—even when it is unnecessary, like in a relationship with a do-right man.

*I cannot afford to f’ around with a woman that is just attractive. I have three children to consider—and movie tickets are off the chain!

*Read “My Theory of Girl Chasing”…

My Theory of Girl Chasing

(SOURCE: Kintespace.com)

As the fine woman behind Brown Sugar embarks on a new enterprise, T-Time, my eye cannot help but capture this one:

The reason why so many men today think that they have to do so little to attract quality chicks, is because they don’t. Too many women out here will do whatever it takes to find, get and keep a man, turning the whole natural order of the dating world on its head. Women are doing the chasing and men are doing the choosing. And apparently I’m the only one who seems to think something is wrong with that.

This reminds me of the Garret Morris skit on the old SNL in response to a Rolling Stones lyric about Black women wanting to have “sex all night long”—just where are these women? Actually, coming from my west-coast North American perspective, I know where they are and I am not willing to go into debt (just from the acting lessons alone) to go there...

Firstly, for my Brown Sugar babe, my wild guess is that she has been biased by the college scene. You see, I ended up at UCSB in my twenties back in the late 1980s—the population of Black women was very small there. We did not dominate enough to have a “dating world.” On the east coast, a collegiate setting, packed full of educated sisters, would have placed me in that “wrong” place Brown Sugar is talking about. But, on the mean streets far from the campus, the only time I have seen (adult) Black women openly chasing Black men is when the possibility (real or imagined) of being near one million or more dollars is involved. Now... for non-Black women the story is a little different—and this can make me quite angry—which can be quite surprising to far too many Black women—because they are even angrier and filled with incorrect assumptions and frustrating inaction (but this topic is beyond the scope of this rant).

Now I have also seen what appears to be adult Black women chasing Black men—but it really wasn’t... What really happens (most of the time) is that Black women (all women) are competing against each other in a social setting (what Jimi Hendrix called “the scene” in that oldie but goodie “Foxy Lady”). The males (of any skin color) taken seriously for consideration in this social setting (is it the “club scene” these days? —or is it the college scene? —or is it the church scene?) are merely prized, token targets for the women. Often this activity is not completely conscious—it just happens. It is similar to the classic story of two blood sisters competing for the attention of one, designated guy. Oftentimes this stuff gets down to the level of natural survival instinct in artificial scarcity.

A woman can feel domination over other women by capturing a male prized by all within the scene. Because of this woman-to-woman competition, they are willing to do that “wrong” thing and chase. In my experience, young women with some kind of ‘childhood issue’ (usually related to her father) will chase a guy in private and in secret. Women—especially women of color with a strong missionary education—know how to deny themselves, very, very well. Bulimia is just one way a woman knows how to starve herself—don’t think my big, thick sisters are not doing the same thang—but in a different way. In my idealism, no one—male or female—should chase or starve at all. But who cares about my non-Olympian ideals when a girl is training for the Olympics! From anon to agon!

For many, competition is everything. Recognition of supremacy is the American way. There is no point for many socially “well”-adjusted females to have a great guy by her side when “nobody” knows about it and “nobody” cares about it. To me, this is another way of saying that people—especially people “of color” who are proud to call themselves “normal”—do not value having a deep, rich, inner life. This is why the television is always playing in the background, keeping “us” company.

What can be extremely uncomfortable to more than a few of my insecure, socially-overactive sisters is their discovery that their “friends” are not happy for them when they show up at the house party with one of the few, undeniably handsome, do-right males on the premises (possibly the entire city). The always-deniable jealousy can get thick at times—to that level of savage, subsistence-level sibling rivalry. Certain sensitive guys may notice this when suddenly they are getting more female attention because the females saw you with one of the girl-“friends.” Stupid guys assume that this attention is for them—but it is really a woman-to-woman thing. I find this behavior demeaning and insulting (now).

What is important to understand here is that I am saying that most women are connected to a social scene. Most functional women are connected to some social structure. (But the terrible irony for me is that this social structure is often dysfunctional.) When you are walking down the street and you see the billionth “cute” girl still on the phone then you are literally seeing her connecting to a piece of that social scene. Here are the stereotypical social scenes women (and men) are connected to:

*The friends from school. This is my bias but most modern North Americans in the W2 world get their real friends from K through 12—this is because most, pre-pubescent children are not cowards and liars. Sadly, in the underclass world in general and the Black world in particular, many of these genuine friends are killed off in large numbers in various physical and meta-physical ways before we can be effective in adult life. This is why most adults reading this have no accurate, non-cynical idea why I am writing this.

*The “friends” from work. Increasingly, North American workers get almost all of their friends from working in a corporation.

*The “friends” from the religion. To me, since the rise of the mega-church this is just like the friends at work—except more open weeping is involved.

*The “friends” from the corporate-sponsored “community.” This is just another, smart-ass way of saying the club scene—even a DJ house party can have corporate, energy-drink, clothing-line overtones.

The reason why I put the “friends” in quotes is because as soon as my lady’s “friend” is laid off, excommunicated or can no longer afford that new silk number for the club that night, the “friend” vanishes from her so-called life. So, to me, chasing a woman means following her through all of these social scenes—often very dysfunctional social scenes that I despise—and (sometimes literally) standing around waiting for her to see that her superficial social life is totally bullshit. But after all of these years I am still not gentle with my words: calling part of my woman’s foundational identity ‘total bullshit’ gives her an excuse to hate me instead of the artificial social systems that continually fail her. Again, I have violated the sacred trust. A “smarter man” knows to just shut the f’ up and get that ass while he can. An even smarter man would live alone in the mountains with rent raiment eating locusts.

But I am not so smart and it is far easier for her to hate me and start a new life with a new “man” putting the ridiculousness of her youthful (and sometimes not-so-youthful) social experiments behind her. My ‘reward’ for chasing this girl is that she grows for the better as a person—but she takes her newly grown self into a new “pure” relationship where she can do no wrong (she hopes). She’ll have a better (false) sense of control there (she hopes). I have learned that an American sense of control is related to American slavery—the archetypal slave master’s sense of “liberty and freedom.” It, of course, is ridiculous and insanely ironic to associate a Black person’s sense of domination with the stereotypical slave master’s—so you, reader, have a choice: you can call me ridiculous and insane or you can call an entire social structure with millions of eagerly-participating, properly-assimilated people ridiculous and insane. Hmm... which one of the choices is easier? You know, fried locust might taste like shrimp...

Do I sound bitter? Let’s get some American perspective. Note how I excluded the “friends from family” in my list above. The high divorce rates and employment-related migrations make family friends a rare, precious possession. I can’t go around feeling like a victim when so much poverty is obviously all around me. I don’t care how much fiat money you have: I know what poor people look like. The teachings of my African ancestors show me how to see. Precious few people transcend poverty with active imagination. This situation is by design. This is not some “curse” put on lonely me. It is the manifestation of oppression.

*I’m sure there are all kinds of boy-girl chasing but where I come from much of the male ‘dedication’ to this activity is based on the sexist principle that women need “help” making a choice. And there is nothing like a little aggression and persistence to lubricate the decision-making process. Sure, I agree you can find women who get “turned on” by this form of aggression and high-energy dominance. Some Black women when pushed by my “rhetoric” often move to get “above” me to take this to a level of solemn, sacred seriousness—because this sexy violent place is surely where the “real” Black man resides. Why am I remembering Alexyss K. Tylor right now? This implies that all of what you may be reading here right now is total bullshit because a “real” Black man would not even waste his ass-smacking time to write shit like this—or even write at all... I look forward to seeing the 10-year wedding anniversary photos based on this theory of Black masculinity.

*In the same vein where flows “the love for the chase” are the same intoxicants that drive soldiers back into the action and hunters back for another chance to kill. To me, the purpose for chasing girls was to get the right one very quickly and settle down. It was through great disappointment to find out how many women “love” the chase itself. Why give up something when you do it so well? Aren’t we going to be young and bling forever? For Black people to deliberately ‘settle down’ in a strategic manner means to accept the real situation of being Black in the white world. For many of my brothers and sisters, this is just too much to bear—party on!

*The desire to show off in front a Black woman means you have already lost. You are already putting yourself in the place where you actually think you can explain yourself to her (likely in a very artificially limited amount of time). She should already have an accurate, basic conceptual model of you by the time you say, “Hello.” When you find that she does not, do not consider yourself her missionary teacher. Accept being a total stranger and respect her ability to see (and not see).

*The woman you want should already have a pretty powerful idea of who you are before you even try to introduce yourself. You think this is bullshit? Just ask some experienced female strippers (who have made a lot of money) to profile men they have never met and see how accurate they are. The ex-wife of Mos Def is coming out with a tell-all book. This might save us some footwork.

*Most women would consider themselves “professional” in the white, corporate sense of the word. This means that I can present myself in serious sincerity as a business contact to a “professional” woman and then move on… Instead of chasing, all we guys need to know is where we can leave our curriculum vitae with contact information. To think that “real” Black women are not this professional means you are hoofing it in poverty. You want to be with someone who knows how to take care of business. What is quite bizarre is that some Black women will treat everyone in this professional manner except for Black males. I have learned the hard way that it is not my place to attempt to correct for or protest against this situation (real or “imagined”).

*Chasing another person usually takes you away from the place where your identity flourishes. It is usually an act of passionate, low self-esteem. There are exceptions. But it is best to cultivate the courage to stand in your place—even when this means your ass will stand alone for many, many years. It is best to think of this situation as wilderness survival in solitary confinement—even when it appears that “civilized” people are all around you in some bustling, fictional 21st century metropolis with shiny iPhones and shit.

That last bullet was easy for me to write now that my hormones are trimmed out... When my sex-drive was pubescent through the roof I was more than willing to humiliate myself for some woman body... (source1 | source2)